useful and flexible, that's me

I'm working!-- no, I've always been working-- I'm employed again and that is why I've been a bit scarce around here.

The Paid Job didn't extend into a second year because I wanted to work fewer days than they wanted me. I can squeeze in two, maybe three days away from home but more than that and our homelife would suffer. Last (school) year I stayed home and as the year went on I added enough PTA/school activities to be busy and useful. Sometimes too busy.

I kept my ear to the ground and one day a lead led to where I am now. I'm at a very nearby church preschool in a make-up-the-job-as-we-go position serving, basically, as the whole special education department. The plan is for me to help teachers identify kids and to make adaptations for them-- both for the child and the teacher.

I'm trying to be useful and flexible. Useful because they can barely afford me. I asked for a salary they agree that I deserve but that they're struggling to give me. It makes me feel concerned that I need to prove my worth.  Flexible because we're making this up.

To some parents I'm a gift- "wow! extra help for my kid for the same price!" But for others, I think I'm a threat- "Is she in the room because of my kid? There's nothing wrong with my kid!"  And since these aren't legally defined special needs kids, we've got to be careful.

I'd assume in a school of about 150 that a dozen or so will have some type of special need. Some may grow out of it and never have an official diagnosis, but some will begin to show more learning problems as they go. I'm hoping to identify both types of children. In my opinion, the diagnosis is really unnecessary unless the parent is using it to receive public services. The adaptations used to teach the child matter much more. If I can provide those now, before any diagnosis is ever acquired, I'm giving them a head start.

So, its been fun, but tiring. Just leaning over tables which are slightly too low to serve as comfortable adult chairs makes my back tired. (A doctor once told me to teach taller kids if I didn't want back pain.) Then there's trying to anticipate when darling little Joey will decide to pick dirt up off the floor and carefully attempt to insert it into someone's eye. Yes, today. Truly no dull moments in this one particular classroom. It feels like a game of Whack-a-Mole. The teachers are extremely competent, but there are multiple ...um... moles in the same class.

I originally thought that going back to work at The Paid Job would be great for blog fodder but I've decided that the chance of falling into a legal hole is too high. Even with names changed to protect the innocent moles, I'm uncomfortable. But yeah, they are funny.

bits and pieces

The eye doctor appointment did indeed lead to glasses for Bug. He picked out frames over the weekend, put them on an hour later, and hasn't taken them off since. He wore them in a baseball game to pitch two innings and at school for picture day Monday. After school he said to me, "I may be like Pook and wear them all the time. I mean, I can, like, see stuff!"  The frames are very modern and somewhat bold, but he knew as soon as he put them on that he liked them best. My job then was to back away and say OK. I'm not used to seeing him in them yet, but in another week he'll look familiar again.

* * * * *

We paid for cable. We upped our cable bill from "technically your service comes from a cable but no, you don't receive any channels which are worth charging you extra to receive" to getting channels showing baseball. We set ourselves up for an October of Braves Baseball! Maybe we'll invite over friends! We can have a playoff party!  When the Braves play the World Series we'll... we'll... Sigh. Over before it could start. We'll probably keep the cable long enough to watch anyway.

* * * * *

Pook has been wanting to understand the news he hears on the radio.  This seems all good and well until you try to explain it. I told  him that some people don't believe that anything but black or white are ok. If black is right then white is wrong. If white is good then black is bad. All gray is compromising your values and not to be considered at all. "Well that seems dumb" was his first response. And actually quite the fitting response to much of what has been going on in Washington. 

eye see you

I’m procrastinating in taking Bug to get an eye check.

CD has had thick glasses since the beginning of time and I've had perfect eyes until I… um, got old.  Humbly, I admit I have prided myself on having good eyesight and having attractive eyes.  When we decided to have kids, we made a deal.  CD would give any future children his hair (thick, blond and curly whereas mine is thin, mousey and straight) and I’d give them my eyes.

Well, Pook came out with straight auburn hair and then got glasses at age 7. Fail on both our parts. We admitted it and moved on. His hair is pretty awesome anyway and his eyes, although hidden behind glasses, are a lovely pale blue. I remember looking down at him when I fed him as an infant and noticing that every eyelash was a different color.  I was sad when he needed glasses.  But, he looks like his daddy in glasses and well, I like the way his dad looks, so its all ok.  Maybe he'll try contacts someday.

Bug got my boring hair but hasn’t YET needed glasses. Recently he mentioned that it was hard to see the writing at the front of the classroom.  So now I’m worried that he might need them. But I don’t want to put those darling baby blues behind glass. And I haven’t made the appointment I think he needs.  If he gets glasses then we’ll have both failed on both hair and eyes with both children and I’ll be so disappointed!

The upside would be that he'd be able to, you know, see.

me gustaría un poco de vino por favor

No, I don't really need any wine right now, thanks. It's only 9:45 am at the moment. This is my pride sentence however. The first I've learned in my new Plan to Learn Spanish in Ten Minutes a Day.

Pook qualified to enroll in a seventh grade Spanish class this year. Bug's new Magnet school teaches everyone German.  I decided I'd learn along with them.* Every night at dinner I ask the boys what they've learned but we just aren't getting anywhere. They seem to learn either "I dunno" or "how to count" and that's about it.  They are not proving to be qualified teachers for me.

CD found out about this program via this article. Memrise assumes that you can spend as much time learning a language as you do checking into FB.  Sure! I can do this!  I'm encouraging him to learn German to please Bug; he already learned some Spanish when he was in school. Neither kid is learning French, which I studied.

The program hooked me pretty quickly. My first sentence, read, written, spoken and understood, could bring me a glass of wine! If it weren't 9:45.


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*I said this about baseball too. When they were tots I thought I could learn how to throw and catch and play ball along side them.  Let's just say, it didn't work.

I kind of also said this about piano. I knew a bit and thought I'd get better as they got better. That hasn't happened either.

Me gustaría un poco de vino por favor!

he gets it

We decided to spend part of our Labor Day weekend visiting Stone Mountain Park. I was feeling a desperate need to use our membership passes at least one more time before expiration, and last time we'd attended the ropes course had been closed. This time we planned to do the ropes course and stay long enough for the nighttime laser show.  We had chairs, bug spray and dinner packed and in the car. 

"Prepare yourself for being in crowds guys. The lines could be really miserable."

We headed in, taking a parking spot near an exit, anticipating the departure to be just as tough as the rest.

Splitting up, we managed to get one to the bathroom and a spot in line reserved. When we were all gathered again, we noticed the "You are 1 hour from your turn" sign approaching.  Yikes. I smiled at the man behind me, on his own with three children under seven. They all had duck quacking noisemakers in their mouths. "You may be regretting those duck quackers on the ride home!" I laughed.

Oh holy duck quackers! Ten minutes of that noise was all I needed before I felt my jaw tighten up.  I forced a smile and remembered how bored the kids must feel.  Deep breath. 

I looked at my boys. Half an hour in line now and still not a complaint. Why was I so lucky?

The dad was beginning to regret his purchase too.  "Stop it. Don't bump your sister. Be quiet. Stop that now. Be quieter."  I cringed as his tired voice began to criticize their not really bad behaviors.

Then it got worse. "If you do that again, we'll have to leave.  Stop that or I'll take it away. Stop it. Stop it now or we'll leave."

I caught CD's eye.  He and I think alike when we hear that sort of tired, ineffective parenting. But then something unexpected happened.  "He just needs to really do it, not just say it," whispered Pook.  CD and I looked at each other again.  "He gets it!" All those years of following through, no matter how unpleasant it became. It pays off. Our baby is growing up.